


in the morning i'll be with you

by badskeletonpuns, harpers_mirror (SapphireBryony)



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi, Not canon-compliant, Post-Hephaestus, rating only applies to the epilogue; the rest is a solid T
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-29
Updated: 2017-12-28
Packaged: 2018-05-17 01:14:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 13,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5848123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/badskeletonpuns/pseuds/badskeletonpuns, https://archiveofourown.org/users/SapphireBryony/pseuds/harpers_mirror
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"things were said-<br/>that i wasn't meant to hear,<br/>that you wish i hadn't,<br/>that saved me"</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. the way things are (after)

This is what Earth life is like, after.

It’s dropping a lot of crap on the ground. 

It’s a pizza every night, because he is never going to get tired of pizza.

It’s an irritating amount of exercise to get used to Earth’s gravity again. 

It’s multi-day marathons of every major movie and TV show he missed while in space. 

And it’s lonely.

God, who would have thought it would be more lonely surrounded by billions of other people than it had been in the depths of space?

It felt like as soon as they stepped back onto Earth, the rest of the crew had a job or a family or something, someone to go back to. And then there was Eiffel. Alone again, naturally. He had almost called up the others several times, but he kept talking himself out of it. 

And by the others he meant Minkowski. He had thought, maybe, you know, she would keep in touch. That’s what you did, right? When you spent years with someone on a desolate spaceship accompanied only by Doctor Doom and Deep Blue Barbie, you stay in touch after. Especially if you had sex. Even if she did have a husband all along.

Right? 

Eiffel only got up the nerve to call her once, late at night after an ill-advised bottle of cheap wine. Because apparently his whole life was just a series of mistakes. Like one of those dolls with a whole bunch of smaller dolls inside of it, except every doll was another screwup.

The phone rang for a few agonizing moments before it told him to leave a message.

“Hey, Minkowschki. Minkovski. Renee. I… Uh. This is-shard to say. I’m drunk, and it’s shtill hard to say. Prob’ly means something. … God, I just miss you so musch. Like, more’n I missed pizza.”

He paused for a moment. 

“Not quite tha’much. But it’s close. I jus’ miss, like, being around you, even when you were yelling a’me. Butcha know, you have a husband now. And then. Why didn’tchyou tell me? That’sh what I don’t understand. All that time. All thoshe pesky feelingsh. And then we were alone, and so tired, and Hera washn’t constat-consant-constantly watching, and I thought, maybe? And you didn’say no. … God, what am I saying?” The machine beeped at him, telling him he had run out of time and he had to delete or send his message. 

He could not send this. Eiffel pulled the phone away from his face, squinting at the fuzzy images on the screen. Which button was the end, again? Drunkenness blurred the images, and he poked at the screen in an effort to find the right one.  
The phone chirped. ‘Message sent.’

Eiffel dropped his head into his hands. Crap.


	2. take care of yourself

I opened my eyes and immediately slammed them shut again. 

"Ow, _fuck_ , that's bright." 

Digging the heels of my hands against them, I winced, not even trying to suppress a loud groan of pain. 

"Okay, let's try this again. Forewarned, forearmed, yadda yadda..." 

Shielding my protesting eyes from the entirely too-cheerful sunlight streaming into the room, I slowly attempted to sit up on the couch, groaning again as I went. 

"Never again. And this time I mean it. Not like every other time I've said I meant it over the last...16...years..." 

I scrubbed my face slowly with my hands and was considering dragging myself to the kitchen for some coffee when I heard my phone beep. It took a second of fumbling but I eventually unearthed it from under the sofa, where it lay face down and, if the beeping was anything to go by, slowly dying. 

"You and me both, man." 

As I groped around for the charger cable, I idly unlocked the phone to see if I've missed anything important. 

"What the - " 

I had 6 missed calls, 2 unheard voicemails, and 8 texts, all from Minkowski. My stomach lurched and seemed to take up residence somewhere in the vicinity of my knees. 

"Oh no, oh _shit_ , oh no..." 

Just like that, the memory of the idiotic drunken ramble I'd left on her voicemail last night slammed into my brain like a bus, if buses were kind of fuzzy 'round the edges and _made your soul die from shame._

"Okay, calm down, let's think about this rationally. I rambled a little bit, told her I missed her - that's not too bad, right? Okay, so I told her I missed her more than I missed pizza while we were in space, sure, but c'mon, she knows how much I love pizza so that was actually a really nice compliment!" 

Maybe I wasn’t so boned after all! I'd call the commander back and sheepishly apologize, and she'd yell at me for drunk-dialing her and threaten me, and I'd make some stupid joke and it would all be okay, just like old times, except - 

"Except then I definitely segued into bitching about her husband and brought up the time we had sex." 

I closed my eyes in horror and sank back into the lumpy couch cushions to contemplate the unending shitshow that was my life. 

"You're a dead man. This is how you die. You drunkenly brought up the thing at the top of the 'Never Bring Up Again' list, the one written there in bright red Sharpie, underlined a bunch of times, with, like, arrows pointing to it, to a woman who you know full well has no compunctions about kicking your ass, after _basically_ telling her you love her. You're dead." 

Opening my eyes, I stared at the phone still clutched in my hand. It looked deceptively innocent but I glared at it anyway. 

"How exactly did I manage to get into less trouble with communications equipment on a goddamn space station? Literally teaching a star to make Spiderman references caused fewer problems than this!" 

There was no helping it though. Hands shaking slightly, I scrolled through the texts first, wanting to put off the yelling as long as possible. 

**2:27 am** \- What the hell Eiffel. Why are you calling me in the middle of the night. Go to sleep I'll call you tomorrow. 

**2:36 am** \- Pick up your damn phone. 

**2:40 am** \- So help you GOD you'd better have a good explanation for this. Answer. Your. Phone. 

**2:42 am** \- Eiffel? Are you okay? 

**2:48 am** \- That's it, I'm coming over there. 

**2:49 am** \- What's your address? 

**2:52 am** \- Doug please answer your phone. 

**3:00 am** \- Please be okay. 

Numbly, I sat the phone down on the couch cushion beside me, my head dropping into my hands. Great, now in addition to being a dead man, I was a dead man who felt like a huge jerk. This was what I did to people. Woke them up in the middle of the night for absolutely no good reason, pissed them off, worried and upset them, for _nothing_. 

Dreading what I was about to hear, I called my voicemail, punching in my code with a lump in my throat and dread gnawing at me. 

The first message she'd left was exactly what I expected - confused and angry. And I'd be lying if I said some small, masochistic part of me didn't kind of enjoy having her yell at me again. 

But the second message, the one she must have left around the time of her last few texts was different. 

"Eiffel, please. Answer the phone. You don't get to do this, to, to just _drop_ all that on me in the middle of the night and then shut me out." 

Her voice sounded shaky and I realized with a jolt of pain that it sounded like she'd been crying. The lump in my throat got more constricting and my eyes felt hot. 

"I'm so sorry. This is all - this is my fault. I pushed you away and - I just couldn't look at you, after we got back. You...you know too much, you were there for too much, and I don't know how to live with that." 

Her voice cracked on the last word and it came out as more of a sob, which was enough to start me crying in earnest. The strongest, most stable, most capable person I knew, and I'd made her cry. She hadn't cried when Hilbert turned on us, or when she thought I'd gotten myself blown up. Mr. Cutter's horrible performance review hadn't been enough to do it either, nope. 

But one thoughtless, stupid phone call from me could do what two years of pain and fear and isolation and nearly dying so many times we'd pretty much lost count by the end couldn't. 

I made myself listen to the rest of her message. 

"But that doesn't matter right now, that's not what's important right now. What matters right now is that you call me back, Doug, so that I know you're okay and I can - " 

The message cut her off there but I could extrapolate the rest, I thought: 

_"So I can get some damn sleep."_

_"So I can be done with your bullshit."_

_"So I can leave you in the past where you belong."_

Slowly, I dialed her number. She picked up on the first ring. 

"Hello? Eiffel, is that you?" 

"Hey, Commander." I cleared my throat. "Sorry about all that nonsense last night. I just got a little too friendly with Mr. Jack Daniels, won't happen again. I've given him a stern talking-to and he promises to behave in the future." 

There was a brief silence from the other end of the line. I tried to wait her out but eventually, curiosity and impatience won. 

"Commander? You there?" 

Another pause. "Yeah Eiffel, I - " She cleared her throat. "I'm here." 

I needed to get out of this call more than I needed a cigarette right now, and that was saying something. "Okay then, good talking to you Minkowski." 

"Oh, are - wait, are you hanging up on me?" 

"Well, you know. Busy guy, got stuff to do! Gotta...do...the things. And stuff." 

"Eiffel...are you sure you're okay?" 

I had to swallow hard to force the answer out. "Absolutely Commander! Back on Earth, aren't I? All the pizza I can eat, all the cigarettes I can smoke, and nobody around to stop me!" My hollow chuckle echoed down the line. 

"Okay, then, if you're sure...I guess, just, take care of yourself?" 

"Aye aye, sir. You too." 

I hung up and dropped the phone like poisonous thing. 

"Sure commander. I'll take care of myself one way or another."


	3. retrouvailles

Minkowski stared at her novel. She had read the same line at least three times now, but could not for the life of her remember a single word. She could, however, remember Doug’s message to her with perfect clarity. ‘I just miss you so much,’ he had said, the words softened by his drunken slur. Minkowski sighed. This was all her fault.

“Renee, are you okay? That’s the third time you’ve sighed in as many minutes.” Dominik was sitting at the table across from her, his lunch lying untouched in front of him. 

She shook her head. “Dominik, I told you everything that happened on that ship. I thought- maybe, by saying, I was putting it behind me. I could let things go back to normal, here on Earth with you. But, God, I can’t stop thinking about him!” 

The sunlight streamed in through the window behind Dominik, haloing him in the soft light. He reached across the table to take Minkowski’s hand, holding it gently. “It’s fine, Renee. You couldn’t have gone through something like that if you didn’t care for him. He knows that, I’m sure.”

“You didn’t hear him last night, Nik. Eiffel… He sounded so lost. And I know I’m not his commanding officer anymore and we aren’t crew; it’s not my job to keep him alive anymore. But I should have been there for him as a friend, if anything! I should have known, it was difficult enough for me to readjust and I had you, does he have anyone? I should-”

“Renee! Hey, hey, it wasn’t your fault.” Dominik was up and out of his seat in an instant, rounding the table to be at her side. He drew her out of her seat and up into a hug. Minkowski took a deep breath. In for the count of four, hold, and then slowly let it go. Dominik's arms around her were solidly warm, and his chest moved slowly with every breath he took. 

The regularity was comforting. He was alive, and they weren’t millions of miles apart anymore. That, at least, was something. The former commander of the Hephaestus breathed in and out in the arms of her husband, and she made her decision. 

Minkowski drew away just far enough to look him in the eyes. “I’m going to be fine, but I’m still worried about Eiffel,” she said resolutely. “I know his address is somewhere in Goddard’s records, and I think things would be better if we could talk face to face.” 

Dominik nodded. “Could I come with you? If this is a crew situation, then I understand, but I feel like I could help.” 

Minkowski smiled at her husband, and leaned up to kiss him softly. 

“That’s a great idea, Nik. God knows you’re the only reason I got through all of my nightmares after the mission.” She paused, glancing away for a moment. Without looking back up at Dominik, she spoke softly. “And if anything happens between Eiffel and I, you should be there. I don’t want to do anything you aren’t comfortable with.”

Dominik pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I will let you know the moment I want to join in,” he joked, and Minkowski couldn’t hold back a smile. 

“I expect nothing less,” she murmured.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yes hello it turns out this is actually four chapters not three whoops


	4. bring the battle home

Eiffel’s least favorite thing about returning to Earth was that somehow he felt more lonely when he had a whole city of people within walking distance than he did when he had four people within light years of him.

After hanging up on Minkowski, which had been a great idea, definitely, no way that could go wrong, Eiffel fell back onto the couch and closed his eyes. Well, nothing could have been more awkward than that! He only meant to shut his eyes for a minute, but when he blinked back into consciousness the afternoon sun was shining directly into his eyes. Ow. He dragged himself off of the couch and headed back into the kitchen to make his coffee. Lord knows he needed a cup right now. Possibly two cups. And a cigarette. 

He dropped onto his only barstool. It creaked ominously, but he ignored it in favor of leaning over the counter to drag his crappy coffee maker within arms reach. At this point he could probably make coffee in his sleep, and the routine was almost relaxing. “C’mon, brew for me, baby,” he muttered, poking the machine. 

While he waited for it to finish, Eiffel grabbed a pack of cigarettes off of the counter. He fumbled for a minute to get it open, hands shaking a little bit more than he wanted to think about. The familiar pull of the nicotine in his lungs settled him again, and he had almost put the whole Minkowski… Situation… Out of his mind. 

The alarm on his coffee maker went off, and he leaned back over to grab his mug from the machine. His stool wobbled to one side dangerously, and it was oddly reminiscent of the creaking hull of the Hephaestus. 

Eiffel decided not to think about the fact that he found the sound kinda comforting.

He stubbed out his cigarette on the counter, leaving another dark circle burned into the cheap tile. Just as he was lifting his cup to his mouth, eyes closed in anticipation of his drink, someone knocked on his door. 

“Eiffel? Can you hear me?” 

Oh, god. 

That was Minkowski. At his door. How did she even find him?!

He spun to face the door, but it was at that moment that his stool creaked its last. It collapsed underneath him, sending both communications officer and coffee crashing to the floor. 

“What was that? Are you okay?” Minkowski was louder now, and there were rattling noises coming from the general vicinity of his door. 

Eiffel opened his mouth - to discourage her? Invite her in? He wasn’t sure. Regardless, before he could speak, he tried to grab hold of the counter to pull himself back to his feet. He did not grab the counter. Eiffel grabbed his coffee machine. 

It fell onto the floor next to him, shattering his mug into even smaller shards and narrowly missing his hand. 

“That’s it, I’m coming in!” Minkowski shouted, because apparently his life was just that awful. Eiffel didn’t even have time to pick himself up off the floor before she literally kicked in his door, goddamn that woman was strong, and then Minkowski was in his house. 

And he was on the floor, soaked in coffee, partially on a broken stool and surrounded by shards of glass and a broken coffee maker.

Well, crap. 

“Uh, hey, Minkowski, it’s nice to see you!” he said jovially. Fake it till you make it, right? 

“Eiffel, what the hell are you doing on the floor? Are you hurt? … Is that broken glass?” 

So much for that strategy. Eiffel grinned resolutely, and tried to get up off the floor. “Don’t worry about it, I’m -ow!” He picked his right hand up off the ground sharply and grimaced at the piece of glass now stuck into his palm. “Dammit.” 

“Are you okay?” Minkowski asked urgently. She started towards him, but stopped mid movement. “Can I help?”

“Like I said, Commander, I'm-ow-fine,” Eiffel muttered. He climbed to his feet, carefully grabbing onto the counter with his left hand to pull himself up. “Tis but a flesh wound.” 

“Renee?” 

Eiffel looked up from his hand, not recognizing the new voice. A man who he vaguely remember greeting Minkowski before the crew went their separate ways was standing in his doorway, frowning at the mess that was Eiffel’s front room. This had to be her husband. Koudelka? Eiffel couldn’t remember his first name... As if this day could get any worse. God, he totally heard the message, didn’t he? Eiffel shook his head. He just had to ruin everything, again, with his stupid drunk dial. Minkowski and Koudelka were probably having a great week before dumb old Doug had to show up and just spill his feelings all over their happy life. 

He waved his non injured hand dismissively at Minkowski and Koudelka, standing awkwardly by his broken door. “Alright, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, not that I’m not totally jazzed about seeing you again, but I’m fine, honestly. I can take care of myself.”

“You’re bleeding,” Minkowski said. She hadn’t stopped looking at him since she had burst into his house, and her expression… God, she looked just like she had on Hephaestus, worry lining her eyes and just like before, it was totally his fault. 

Eiffel smiled wryly. “Gold star for you, Captain Obvious. It’s fine. I’ll just grab a bandaid or something, I’ll live.” 

Minkowski shook her head. “I don’t think it is, Eiffel.” 

He laughed nervously. “What, no! I just gotta clean up my hand and the floor and things are A-OK here in Fort Eiffel, serious-” 

“Doug,” she said. “When was the last time you got a full night’s sleep?” 

“...I don’t have to answer that.” 

The two former crew members held eye contact for a moment, neither willing to be the first to back down. 

Koudelka cleared his throat. Almost in unison, Minkowski and Eiffel turned to look at him. He smiled softly. “If you don’t mind, Eiffel, I’m certified in first aid. I can help with your hand, because that is a fairly nasty cut. Renee, you can help clean up the floor. We want to help, Eiffel, it’s no trouble.”

Eiffel hesitated. Koudelka’s words were eerily familiar, and not in a good way. The memory of the first time he had met Cutter rang in his mind, as clear as if it had happened yesterday. ‘I want to help, Doug. Trust me, I know exactly what to do!’ Yeah, that had had an absolutely stellar ending. Sure, Koudelka probably meant way better than Cutter ever did, but still. It was not really a parallel Eiffel wanted to think about.

The wound in his hand twinged, and he couldn’t hold back a wince. It was really starting to sting now. “I…” he began. Koudelka had to be a good guy, if Minkowski trusted him. Eiffel looked down at his hand again, and back up at Koudelka. Help with his hand and newly broken appliance would be nice, at least, if nothing else. “I don’t think I actually have a first aid kit? Maybe a box of band-aids, somewhere, probably.” 

The other man nodded. “I think I have a kit in my suitcase, let me go get it.” He walked out quietly, and Eiffel kind of wanted to ask him to stay. But that was totally dumb and weird and Koudelka was coming back, anyway. 

Minkowski watched her husband leave with a faint smile, before turning to Eiffel, and damn it, why was Minkowski so cute when she smiled? This was not fair. 

“Hey, are you even listening to what I’m saying?” she asked. Crap. She had said something?

“Yeeeeees?”

“Of course you were,” Minkowski said, still smiling. “Alright, I know you definitely listened to me the first time I said it, but where do you want what’s left of this barstool?”


	5. sorry about the mess

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember when we thought this was gonna be a quick little three-chapter thing? Yeah, no idea what we were thinking.

I plopped down in the sad, sagging recliner chair in the corner of the living room and picked at the neat bandage Dominik had just finished wrapping around my hand. On the upside, I’d overheard Minkowski use his first name, so, yay, I wasn’t going to be stuck calling him “Mr. Koudelka” forever, which would have been really weird. That was something, I guess.

On the other (cut and bleeding) hand, I now felt like an even _bigger_ nuisance.

 _“We just want to help you,”_ Dominik had said. Ugh. Heard that before, heard that before plenty of times and it never ended well. I’m the kind of person people often say they want to help, mostly because of my generally-unchallenged status as “incurable fuck-up of the century,” so I know of what I speak. And when people say they want to help you, it somehow always comes out sounding more like _“We don’t trust you to be able to take care of yourself,”_ flavored liberally with either well-meaning or condescending pity. 

Neither is good. And neither feels remotely helpful.

Now, of course, coming from Minkowski and her husband...I knew they probably meant it genuinely. 

Somehow, that was actually _worse._

And regardless of how lousy I felt about accepting their help, it didn’t change the fact that I had a slightly-apprehensive near-stranger sitting on my couch next to my former commanding officer, who I was having real trouble looking in the eye right now.

“So, uh...sorry about the mess,” I said to try and break the ice, gesturing at the mountain of pizza boxes, dirty laundry, and beer bottles that filled my living room. Not to mention, well, _myself._

Minkowski laughed, sounding a little uncomfortable. “Eiffel, I’m the one who broke down your door. At least some of this mess is mine to claim, I think.”

“Fair enough.” I didn’t want to go on, didn’t want to deal with it, didn’t want to ask if anyone else could see Dumbo and his army of pink elephants on parade right there in the room with us, but I knew Minkowski too well to think she’d be deflected when she was on the warpath like she clearly was today. I’d seen her pursue stuff that mattered less with much scarier determination and I’d be damned if I was going to let this turn into a repeat of the Great Plant Monster Hunt of Whatever Year That Was, starring me in the role of everyone’s favorite experimental sample. 

“So...” Come on, Doug, out with it already. “What brings you two to this side of town?” 

_Oh goddamn it._

I cringed when I saw the look that crossed Minkowski’s face.

“Seriously Doug? You’re _really_ going to do this? After - “

Dominik leaned forward to intervene, cutting his wife off. In that moment, he became my favorite person in the entire room, a title he immediately lost when he promptly bailed on me. “I’m going to take the first aid kit back to the car and then give cleaning up the remains of your coffee maker a shot, okay Doug? Renée?” 

Minkowski glared at her husband and then sighed, looking tired. “Yeah, that’s probably a good idea. Thanks Dominik.”

He left the room quickly and quietly, leaving the two of us staring at each other. Minkowski looked like she wanted to strangle me and honestly, I didn’t blame her.

After an incredibly long and awkward pause, I looked away, closing my eyes. “I’m sorry,” I muttered. “I’m sorry you came all the way over here and I’m sorry I called. That was inappropriate and stupid, which hey, basically my M.O., right? But you shouldn’t have to deal with my crap, Commander. So...sorry. I’ll be fine, you and the wonder-hubby can leave whenever.”

I knew I sounded defensive but I really didn’t care. I just needed her _gone._ Needed to put off dealing with her until I had my shit together, had a better idea of what to say to her. So, roughly in a hundred years or so, then. Sometime after the first of never.

“God damn it, Eiffel,” she said in response and man, she sounded tired. I chanced a look at her and my stomach lurched. Her eyes were red and brimming with tears, and the lines on her forehead seemed deeper than they had when she’d come bursting in. 

This was what I did. This was the effect I had on them. I carved my troubles into their skin and left dark shadows under their eyes. Under normal circumstances, I’d kind of want to kick my own ass for such weirdly emo-kid thoughts but in that moment, I totally lacked the energy to care even about my own stupidity. Gazing tiredly at Minkowski, I shrugged.

“Don’t know what you expect, Minkowski. I did something ill-advised and selfish. You’re actually still surprised by _anything_ dumb I do?”

The fist to the jaw caught me off guard. Holy shit, I hadn’t even seen her move from the couch. Fast like a freaking _ninja,_ that woman. My head snapped back, my hand flying to my throbbing face.

“Jesus, what the _fuck_ Minkowski?” 

“Oh god, Doug, I...”

She sank to her knees on the floor in front of my chair, hands clutched over her mouth. She looked completely stunned and horrified.

I should have let it go. I probably - no, I _definitely_ deserved that, and like a thousand more, after all the shit she’d put up with from me over the years.

I should have let it go but right then, my jaw aching, my head spinning, every bit of frustration and rage inside of me building - I completely lost it.

“No, seriously, _what the fuck?_ You come over here, break your way into my fucking house, drag _him_ with you because yes, I am absolutely in a place where I want _total strangers_ to see me fall the fuck apart. I don’t want your pity, I _don’t_ need your help, I don’t _want_ you here, either of you, so will you just _leave me the fuck alone?”_

I realized that at some point in my rant, I’d stood up and was looming over Minkowski, but she jumped to her feet, getting as close to my level as she could reach in normal gravity.

“No, Eiffel, I _can’t_ do that because I’m terrified if I do, the next call I get about you will be to come identify your body at the freaking morgue or something! Or that there will never _be_ a next call because you’ll just drop off the map and vanish forever. I can’t, because I worry about you and I love you and if anything happened to you that I could have prevented, I don’t know how I’d ever live with myself!”

We stared at each other, breathing hard. A few tears had escaped to streak down her cheeks and I was dimly aware that my own face was wet too. 

Dropping back into my chair, I buried my face in my hands and felt her arms come around me an instant later. The tears flowing in earnest now, I sagged against her, felt her lips brush my hair.

“Shhh, it’s okay. It’s okay, Doug. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have hit you.” She kept this up for a while longer but it combined with the ringing in my ears to form a hazy background noise.

Something was nagging at me as the tears slowed but I was having trouble focusing my thoughts on any one thing long enough to catch hold of it. Sniffling, wiping my eyes and wishing that, just for _once_ I could act my age and not like a small and petulant child, I pulled away from her. Minkowski dropped her hold on me instantly and tried to take a step back but I caught her hand.

“Hey, sorry, didn’t meant to melt down all over you there,” I said, forcing a smile as I looked up at her. I stood up, smoothing the facade over my feelings as I did. “Don’t worry abo- ” 

Then it hit me.

Before I could consider the consequences, I blurted out, “Wait. Did you say...did you say you loved me?”

Minkowski’s face turned a vibrant shade of red. “No.”

“You did! You totally did!” I crowed, taking advantage of the reprieve and milking it for all it was worth. And, if I was being totally honest, trying to process exactly how I felt about this. Because, uh, wow.

“No, I - shut up. I was just worried about you. You jerk,” she replied, face still red.

Dropping the “gloating asshole” routine before she reconsidered and punched me again, I sobered, gazing seriously at her. The voices of doubt and common sense were creeping in again anyway. 

“Well, thanks, Minkowski. I appreciate the sentiment. Sorry if I made things weird but, I’m fine. Really. You don’t need to worry about me.”

“Well you sure need someone to,” she snapped, glaring at me, arms crossed. 

“Really don’t,” I said lightly, but with an edge of my earlier anger creeping back in. “Grown-ass man here. Successfully cared for myself for many a year now.”

 _“Really,”_ Minkowski said, her voice dripping with skepticism. Then she stopped and ran a hand through her hair, looking frustrated. “No, no! We’re not going back into this spiral. We’re not going to keep doing this.” Sighing, she stared up at the ceiling for a long moment. “Doug...”

And then two things happened in very quick succession. 

One, Minkowski closed the distance between us and kissed me.

And two, Dominik walked back in from the kitchen. “Knock knock,” he said, pushing open the folding door. “Is it safe to - oh!”

_Shit._

Panicking, I wrenched away from Minkowski and made a break for the door.


	6. and it's our time now if you want it to be

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Several very important conversations, a few tears, and something approaching a resolution.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking with this story through its incredibly long hiatus! Look for an epilogue to go up shortly. These final two chapters were written as a joint W359 Big Bang 2017 entry, in partnership with [rahayn's amazing artwork!](http://rahayn.tumblr.com/post/169028755205/three-amazing-characters-in-one-amazing-fic-this)
> 
> Official series soundtrack can be found [here.](https://harpers-mirror.tumblr.com/post/169322982576/some-of-you-may-have-noticed-that-the-lovely)

_ Oh god. _

I stared at the scarred bar top, my brain a tornado of panic. I swirled my glass through the puddle of condensation it sat in, fidgeting aimlessly as disjointed images flashed through my mind. Minkowski standing in front of me, kneeling in front of me, looking so tired, looking so determined just before she kissed me...

_ Oh god. _

This was bad. This was  _ really really _ bad. I didn’t know what the hell had possessed her to  _ do _ that - pity? confusion? a really dedicated attempt to shut me up? - but Koudelka had no way of knowing  _ she _ had done anything at all. 

Maybe it should stay that way. Let him think I was just some creep who made a move on his wife, let Minkowski keep her husband. Unless...he hadn’t heard my message, had he? There was no way he could have, right? Nobody hears some drunk idiot talking about banging their wife then pays said drunk idiot a visit to bandage his wounds, right? I’d kill to know what Minkowski had told him. 

Not like it mattered now, as I was definitely  _ persona non grata _ in that household. Guess it was just me and Mr. Beam, together again. Together forever. We’re tying a knot they never can...

_ Oh god. _

I was still toying with my glass but I hadn’t taken a sip in ages. Felt too sick. Maybe it was still the epic hangover talking, but every time I thought about the look on her face when she hit me, my stomach would lurch and make booze seem like the worst idea conceivable. 

Maybe I should leave. Like, leave  _ town _ leave. ‘Leavin’ on a jet plane’ leave. If I was here, Minkowski would see me as her responsibility and try to - I shuddered -  _ deal _ with me. Although, I figured, if I disappeared then she’d turn it into some big dramatic search and rescue. “The Hunt for Doug October.” Shades of her pursuit of the plant monster, but this time it would be  _ me  _ at the end of the harpoon gun.

And look how that had turned out for ol’ Blessie.

Dropping my head to the bar, I thumped my head very gently against the wood. Ugh. Wasn’t I an attractive picture? 34 goddamn years old, in a bar in the middle of a Saturday afternoon, already reeking of booze, and feeling sorry for myself while moping over the death of murderously sentient plants. 

No wonder Minkowski had dodged me for months.

Sitting up, I took an aggressive swig of the burning liquid and held back a cough as some of it went down the wrong way.

I signaled the bartender for another and sighed, slumping back in my seat and starting to get actually angry with myself. If I had just kept my mouth shut, if I had just lost her number, if I’d just let her live her life. If I had never kissed her - but hell, back then we both figured we’d be dead the next day or hour or minute, so what did Lieutenant-Commander Renee Minkowski, married woman and usually sensible person, have to lose by fucking her idiot communications officer? She couldn’t have known that decision was going to follow her back to earth like a starving, mangy puppy she’d have to keep feeding.

She didn’t deserve this shit. 

With another swig of my drink, my mind was made up - once I was sure she and Koudelka had vacated my premises, I’d slip back in, get some shit together, and dip for a while. I wouldn’t totally ghost her, I wasn’t a monster and I  _ definitely _ didn’t want to get harpooned. Wasn’t gonna be anybody’s white whale, not even hers. There’d be a note, or a message - no, definitely a note. Voice messages were how I’d ended up in a dive bar at 2:30 in the afternoon. A written note, one where I could be sure to say exactly what I meant and nothing else.

I slid a napkin across the bar, filched the pen left behind by the last sad sack who’d cashed out his tab, and started writing.

_ “Dear Minkowski,” _

Wait, was “dear” appropriate? Would that get my ass kicked? Maybe. Better safe than sorry. I crossed it out. Call this my rough draft I guess.

_ ~~ "Dear ~~ Minkowski, _

_ Sorry for all the trouble I caused. Guess some things never change, right? I fuck up and you clean up and the status stays nice and quo.” _

Wow, that was bitter at a level that surprised even me. Scratch that.

_ ~~ "Dear ~~ Minkowski, _

_ Sorry for all the trouble I caused. Guess some things never change, right? ~~ I fuck up and you clean up and the status stays nice and quo. ~~ Anyway, I’m gonna get out of your way and let you live your nice, happy, made-it-back-to-earth life with Koudelka. You deserve it. He’s exactly what you deserve. Don’t feel like you need to hunt me down or anything. I’ll be fine. Always am.” _

I wavered for a moment on how to sign this masterpiece. “Yours?” Haha, no. “Sincerely?” Too formal, both for me and for a note written on a slightly damp bar napkin. Finally, I decided on simply scrawling my name at the bottom and looked over what I’d written.

Ugh. This was the pathetic adult equivalent of a four-year-old declaring they were running away from home and walking to the edge of the lawn with a backpack full of cookies and underwear while wondering if Mom was coming after them.

“Hey Doug,” came the sudden voice from behind me.

Fuck. Looked like Mom had followed me after all.

Slowly, I spun around on my stool. Koudelka stood behind me, hands in his pockets and rocking slightly back on his heels, the picture of casual unconcern. Like we were two buddies who’d run into each other at the bar watching the big game, and not at all like he’d tracked me down to kick my ass.

I realized I was staring and sat up a little straighter. “Uh...hi.” Brilliant start, Doug. I cleared my throat. “You...wanna sit?” If he was sitting, I figured it would be harder for him to kill me. Maybe. Who knew what kind of crazy sophisticated international man-of-mystery sneaky-murder techniques he had at his disposal?

While this totally not at all insane line of thought was dancing the can-can through my brain, Koudelka nodded and sat. He spotted the scribbly napkin in front of me. Oh shit -

“May I?” he asked and honestly, what did I have left to lose at this point? 

“Sure,” I sighed, sliding it over. “Not exactly up to the standard of prose you’re used to I’m sure, so be gentle.”

Koudelka laughed. “You’d be surprised, man. The features department before they’ve had a nice thorough editing is a  _ scary _ place.” He scanned the napkin, his smile fading. When he looked at me again, his eyes were very serious.

“Doug - wait, no, before I say anything else, is it okay to call you Doug? I assumed, but since Renee tends to call you by your last name, I realized I should probably ask.”

Wait, what? This was a very strange prelude to an ass-kicking.

“Uh,” I stammered. “Y-yeah, that’s fine. First name, last name, rude nicknames, sexy pet names, I answer to anything.”

_ Did I have a death wish what the actual fuck.  _

“I mean - “ I started to try and apologize or clarify or appeal to Inspector Spacetime to show up and rewind the last five minutes.

Koudelka snorted a laugh. “Noted. Getting slightly ahead of things but, eh, I like a man with forethought. And damn, Renee wasn’t kidding when she said talking to you is like a contact sport. Always keep people on their toes, huh?”

He hadn’t killed me, and seemed to be in a strangely good mood, so I risked a small laugh. “Yeah, I’m not sure Minkowski really believes I speak English. Just like, some weird pidgin approximation of English-sounding phrases made entirely of pop culture references she doesn’t understand.”

Now he laughed for real. “I can’t even imagine how frustrating that must have been for  _ both _ of you. I love her, but there are some serious gaps in my wife’s cultural knowledge. Did you know she’d never seen Ghostbusters  _ or _ The Goonies until I made her watch them?”

“I believe it,” I shot back. “She didn’t understand the significance of Star Wars Day even after I explained it to her! That lucky jerk! She gets what is objectively the coolest day of the  _ whole year _ for her birthday and doesn’t even appreciate it.”

Koudelka sighed ruefully. “It’s tough, man. She’s weirdly obstinate about remaining functionally pop culturally illiterate.” He patted me on the shoulder. “Someday, Doug. Someday, we shall force her to sit down and, I don’t know, watch a bunch of really cheesy-but-wholesome ‘90s sci fi or something.”

I laughed, but - wait, his hand was still on my shoulder. I guess I must have reacted enough that he noticed because he dropped his hand back to the bar and the smile vanished from his face.

Fuck. I guess the fun times were over. “Look, Koudelka - “

“Please, Doug, just call me Dominik.”

“Uh, sure. Sorry. Dominik, I... I’m really sorry for what happened back there. At the house I mean. With the, uh, kissing and everything. That was so,  _ so _ inappropriate of me and it’ll never happen again, I swear.”

“Doug - “

“Please, dude, you have to believe me. I’ll leave town, I’ll do whatever it takes. I was kind of already planning on it. You guys don’t need me here fucking up your lives, especially not after you just got your wife back from the dead.”

“Doug,” he cut in again and he looked a little exasperated so I cut off my ramble. “I’m not mad.”

“Oh,” I said like a total genius. “That’s... good? I’m... glad?” I paused, eyeing him. “So if you’re not here to punch me or to tell me to stay away from your wife or something else vaguely chauvinistic yet understandable, why  _ did _ you track me down? Was it just because Minkowski was worried? I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have just ducked out on her like that, I’ll let her know I’m okay and I’ll talk to her before I leave town.”

“Doug!” said Dominik in a tone that would have been considered ‘exasperated shouting’ if we hadn’t been in a bar. “I’m not mad, she’s not mad, no one is going to punch you as far as I’m aware, and I’m here because we were worried about you and care about you, you ridiculous man!” He paused as I sat there stunned, looking past me at something and nodded briefly.

“Also some other varied and complicated reasons we can get into later. But don’t take my word for it,” he continued in a quieter tone. “Check out the hot redhead over there and see if you don’t listen better to what  _ she _ has to say.”

Huh?

I turned and looked in the direction he was pointing and there was Minkowski, sitting alone in a dark corner booth and drinking a soda. She looked an alarming combination of curious and worried, but gave a small wave when she saw me looking at her.

Turning back to Kou - to  _ Dominik _ , I asked him, “Has she been here this whole time?”

He nodded. “Yup. She told me you had zero awareness of your surroundings, especially - and I quote - ‘When he’s in a funk and navel-gazing about something.’”

“Hey, I resemble that remark,” I replied absently, turning back around to look at Minkowski. “But she’s right as usual. Should we be heading thataway?”

Dominik slid off his stool and gestured toward the booth. “Be my guest.”

I stood up and made my way over to the booth, leaving my drink on the bar behind me. This conversation was too important for booze. 

“Hey,” I said as I got closer. “Uh, fancy meeting you here.”

She rolled her eyes but smiled a little and patted the vinyl of the seat beside her. 

“Sit,” she said as I hesitated. “We’ve got to talk to you and - ”

“ - and me and her sitting on one side while you sit alone on the other is a little more Spanish Inquisition than we’d like,” interrupted Dominik as he slid into the empty side of the booth.

I sat, cautiously. “Promise she won’t bite?” I asked Dominik without thinking. Oh sweet fancy Jesus, one of these days I’d learn to think before I opened my mouth but that day was clearly not today. I cringed, “I mean - ”

Dominik chuckled. “I make no promises man. It’s the risk you take to keep her around.”

Okay,  _ that _ sentiment I could relate to, and I grinned at him. “Don’t I know it. Remind me to tell you some day about the time she locked me in a broom closet for a week.”

Dominik laughed as Minkowski cleared her throat. “Guys, I’m sitting right here and can, in fact, hear both of you.”

“Sorry sir,” I said without thinking and -

“Sorry darling,” said Dominik at the same time. He turned to me. “Wait,  _ sir?” _ he asked. “You call my wife ‘sir?’” 

I felt my face go bright red. “Sorry!” I spluttered out. “I just - I’m used to responding that way when Minkowski is annoyed with me. It’s a habit. It’s not - I mean, it’s not a  _ weird  _ thing or - ”

“Nik, don’t tease him,” Minkowski - my savior, my angel - broke in. Hmm, she called him by a nickname? That was interesting. 

“I don’t know why Goddard insisted on that terminology. Pretty sure they know as much about  _ actual  _ military protocol as Eiffel does.”

I nodded agreement, and then her words sunk in. “Hey! I - no, that’s fair. I’ll give you that one... Wow. It feels really weird not to have something like ‘sir’ to stick on the end of my sentences. I’ll have to figure out something else to call you.”

She eyed me, looking worried again. “Choose carefully, Eiffel. Choose...  _ wisely.” _

Well, that was basically tacit permission, right? Cool. Hmm, I’d have to give this some thought. Though maybe not right now - Minkowski was waving a hand in front of my nose.

“HuhwhatI’mlistening!” I blurted out. Dominik choked on his drink and Minkowski sighed.

“If you’re back with us, Doug,” she said, sounding  _ very _ patient, “there’s a couple of things we have to talk about.”

Oh.

Right.

My stomach dropped again and the light, joking atmosphere of the last few minutes turned to lead in the air around us.

“Right...” I said flatly. “Yeah, sorry, I had a nice little note and everything but your husband confiscated it.”

“Actually, Doug,” said Koudelka, jumping in, “I have it in my pocket if you want Renee to see it. Do you?”

No. Yes. Fuck, did it even matter any more?

I shrugged. “I guess,” I answered him, sounding petulant and hating myself for it. Wordlessly, he pulled the napkin out of his pocket and handed it across the table to her. Out of the corner of my eye I watched her read it, watched her read through the scribbles and cross-outs and smudged self pity.

When she looked at me, her eyes were sad. “Doug...” she said, trailing off like she didn’t know what to say.

I flapped at hand at her and looked away. “Minkowski, it’s not a big deal. Also, I’d totally have cleaned that up before I actually gave it to you.”

Suddenly, her hand was resting on my arm. The point of contact burned. I looked at her and - when had she slid so close?

“Doug, listen to me, okay?” I nodded. “If you want to leave town and start over somewhere else, I’m not going to stop you.”

There it was, she wanted me gone, she was sick of dealing with my and all my shit, she - 

“But I only want you to leave if  _ you honestly want  _ to. Not because you think you need to, or because you think I want you gone. Because if you disappear based on what you think I want? I will hunt you down and kick your ass.”

Wait, what?

“I mean it,” she said, correctly interpreting the confusion on my face, I guess. “How could you - ”

“Darling...” interrupted Koudelka warningly. “Remember what we talked about?”

Minkowski sighed. “Right. Sorry. Doug, I... I don’t want you to go anywhere. I  _ like _ having you around, even if I have trouble showing it sometimes. I...” I watched her swallow, curiously detached. “I like  _ you, _ Doug. You’re probably my best friend.”

Oh.

Well, wasn’t that interesting.

Now I was getting angry. “Your best friend?” I shot back. “Really? You haven’t said more than two dozen words to me since we got home! It was always the same thing, on the  _ rare _ occasions you called me at all - ‘Hope you’re not dead, my life is perfect, bye.’”

She spluttered, and now her face was turning red too. “That’s not fair, Eiffel, not even a little. I  _ never _ said my life was perfect!”

“You never had to!” I was shouting but I didn’t care. “You had  _ him _ and you were home and you sure as hell didn’t need me. What else did I need to know? It was so obvious.” I snorted, looking away and wishing I’d brought my drink over to the table after all. “There was no chance in hell you’d look at me as an appealing option when I wasn’t  _ literally _ the only non-murderous human for eight light years around.”

“Oh  _ screw you, _ Eiffel,” Minkowski responded, and the fury in her voice ripped through me. Good, maybe now she’d just let me be. “That is incredibly unfair and largely the product of your paranoid, deluded, self-sabotaging imagination!”

“That’s  _ enough.”  _ Shit, Koudelka sounded  _ pissed. _ __“Both of you. Stop fucking antagonizing each other, stop trying to hurt each other - _ yes, _ Renee, I do mean both of you. I heard more of that conversation earlier than either of you would have liked, I daresay. Just stop and take a deep breath and think about what you’re doing to each other!”

Both of us looked down at the tabletop. I stared at my hands, clenched into fists. Beside me, I could hear Minkowski breathing fast. Some of the breaths sounded more like sobs.

I wanted so badly to make her stop hurting. I wanted so badly to stop being the one to hurt her. And honestly, given my behavior so far these past 24 hours, I figured there was precious little I could do to make things significantly worse. So I reached over carefully and without looking at her, took her hand in mine.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered as I did it. My throat was thick and my eyes were burning. “Minkowski, I am so,  _ so _ sorry. I shouldn’t have said any of that to you, I shouldn’t have  _ done _ any of this to you.” I wrapped my other hand around the one I held, since she hadn’t pulled away yet. “This is why I need to leave. I need to get out of your way and let you live your life and be  _ happy." _

The tears had started to roll down my cheeks but I didn’t want to let go of her hands. Fuck, I would probably never get to be this close to her ever again so I was taking the advantage while I still had it.

“You are never going to be able to be happy while I’m here and you deserve  _ so _ much more than me dragging you down.”

_ “Don’t,” _ she said, breaking in. “Just, stop, Doug, I...” She took a deep breath, and I saw tears on her face too. “I don’t want you to go anywhere. I’ve treated you so badly since we’ve been back but I just - I  _ couldn’t _ face everything we did - that  _ I _ did - up there. I wanted more than anything to just forget about Maxwell and Hilbert and everything that happened to you and to all of us.”

From a million miles away, I heard Dominik draw in a sharp breath. Without really considering it, I moved one of my hands to rest on her back, moving in idle circles. I had no idea if it was comforting but I figured  _ I _ wouldn’t hate it. She didn’t seem to notice.

“And you were there,” she continued, her eyes boring into mine now, “like a living, breathing reminder of everything I wanted to forget and I just couldn’t  _ deal _ with you. And I knew I was hurting you but I just didn’t - Doug, I didn’t know what to do so I was cowardly and ignored it and I guess that’s all I am, in the end. A coward.”

Whatever of my heart that was left unbroken crumbled to dust in my chest and I pulled her in for a hug. I didn’t care that her husband was sitting right there, I didn’t care that we were in public and probably drawing way too much attention, I didn’t care about my own mountains of issues and angst. In that moment, I didn’t care about anything other than making Minkowski not be sad anymore.

_ “No,” _ I said emphatically against her hair. “No, Minkowski, you are so, so many things but a coward is definitely not one of them. Our brains are so full of horrifying stuff - how could we  _ not _ have trouble acting normal around each other? Or at all? We’re not normal, not anymore, and we’ve had to see and do shit that other people can’t even imagine. But you know who you are.”

She took a deep, shuddering breath in my arms. “Oh,” she whispered, “I know  _ exactly _ who I am now.”

I leaned back so I could look her in the eyes. “And so do I. Remember? I’ve known for ages. You’re Commander Renee Minkowski, badass space pilot! You jump out of space stations into solar storms and look beautiful doing it.”

She laughed, a little wetly, and brushed some of the tears from her cheeks. I instinctively wiped my thumb over the ones she’d missed and kept talking.

“Boss, you’re the woman who saved my life approximately 437 times and, while I may not always  _ thank _ you for that, it shows how very not-a-coward and not-a-bad-person you are. You’re my freaking hero, and I - ” 

Aw hell, in for a penny, in for a pound.

“ - and I love you. Always have.”

There. Done. I said it, out loud and in front of witnesses, and god help me, there was no taking it back.

She was looking at me with wide eyes and looking at her, I basically stopped breathing for a minute. 

Which was a real problem when she kissed me, because it literally left me gasping for air like a stunned fish. Though in all honesty, I doubt my reaction would have been terribly different if I’d been fully oxygenated.

I could taste the salt from her tears on her lips which struck me all at once as incredibly sad and also a crazy privilege, that she’d let me this close when she was this vulnerable.

Also, kissing Renee Minkowski in general was a crazy privilege in and of itself  _ oh boy howdy was it _ . My hand that had been on her back tangled itself in her hair, while both of hers did the same to mine and -  _ fuck _ \- it was really an extreme shame we were in public and I was limited in my ability to express just how much I enjoyed that.

She bit down lightly on my lower lip and, yeah, nope, stick a fork in me, I was done. I pulled back with a gasp. Since we were still tangled up in each other, we didn’t make it very far apart, and stayed leaning together, foreheads touching.

“Doug,” she whispered, sounding a little unsteady herself. “I know. And I love you too.”

The words hit me like a bolt of lightning and I leaned back, mind going a million miles an hour. When she'd said them earlier I hadn't been ready to hear them and take them seriously, but this moment was world's away from that one. Staring at her, I stuck to my usual MO and blurted out the first thing that came to mind.

“Did - did you just make a Star Wars reference?!”

Her mouth dropped open and Koudelka - shit! I’d actually managed to forget he was sitting there - cracked up laughing.

“Doug,” he said between gales of laughter. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but you are a  _ remarkable _ human being.”

I groaned and dropped my head to thud gently against the table top. “Someone just...kill me now,” I said. I’d gone mouth-first against a drinks coaster so it came out muffled.

Dominik was still laughing at my pain. “Oh no,” he said. “We can’t kill you. That would ruin  _ everything." _

“Nik!” hissed Minkowski warningly.

Okay, something was going on and my curiosity outweighed my humiliation. I sat back up.

“Okay guys, everything that happened in the last five minutes aside, what is going on? I still don’t know what you pulled me over here to talk about, or why Dominik is so weirdly okay with all of this, or why  _ you," _ I glanced at Minkowski, “haven’t just straight-up murdered me.” I flushed redder and glanced down at my hands.

“I mean, uh, I guess those previously-asided five minutes gives me some sort of clue. But guys, I’ve got the border pieces mostly put together and I found all the corners, but the middle of the puzzle is still kind of a random mess. Someone wanna help me put the pieces together? Please?”

Dominik sobered, but didn’t look mad, just less giggly. “Alright, Doug. The reason I’m, quote, ‘weirdly okay’ with all of this is because I knew it might happen. Renee and I talked before she left on the mission about what our, uh, expectations were for each other while she was gone. We established some guidelines about what was okay to do, and with who. So basically, I already knew about you guys, she told me after she got back. Not,” he said hastily, “like  _ details _ or anything. That’s private unless you guys want to share. Otherwise, not my business.”

“Oh,” I managed to get out. “That’s...good?”

“Now,” he continued, glancing at Minkowski. “I do wish Renee had been a little more...upfront...about the specifics of all this with you. But that’s neither here nor there. To make a long story short - ”

Ugh, that phrase was ruined forever. I winced and it must have shown on my face because Dominik broke off talking and glanced back and forth between me and Minkowski. 

“Okay, I don’t know what happened there but I’m striking that phrase from my lexicon,” he said. “Anyway, basically, I know, I’m fine with it in the past, and, if you guys want it, I’m fine with it in the present and future. Heck, Doug, if we’re laying all our cards out on the table,  _ I _ like you too.”

What.

“You - ”

“Yes, in  _ that _ sense. Just from how Renee talked about you I really thought I might. Plus I know my wife has good taste. But hey, we just met, and under very strange circumstances, so that’s  _ clearly _ an issue to be discussed once we know each other better and things are less fraught.”

I snuck a glance at Minkowski just as she was doing the same to me. We caught each other’s gaze and this time, it was like seeing the sun start to rise. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. What the hell had I done in a past life to deserve this kind of miracle? I smiled at her, tentatively. She smiled back and reached down to take my hand.

And she thought she was a coward.

Lacing my fingers through hers, I turned to face her fully. “Minkowski... is this really a thing? A thing that you’re really okay with? Really?”

Her smile widened. “Okay, you’re officially prohibited from using the word ‘really’ for the next five minutes.”

“Aw, really?” I asked before I could stop myself. She rolled her eyes but the smile didn’t waver.

“Yes. Really. On - on all counts. You’re an important part of my life, Eiffel. It wouldn’t feel right not having you around. The, uh, the rest...” She was beet red again, and it was adorable.

“The rest?” I prompted teasingly.

“The rest,” chimed in Dominik, reaching across the table to lay his hand atop our joined ones, “is just the icing on the cake. And who doesn’t like icing?” He squeezed our hands and then slid out of his seat. “I’m going to go settle our tab and then I think we should get out of here. We have stuff to do.”

He headed toward the bar, leaving me and Minkowski alone. I turned to her, making sure I had serious face on even though all I wanted to do was beam. 

“This is really what you want?” I asked.

“Really, Doug,” she replied just as seriously. “I don’t know what’s going to happen but, if we learned anything out there, it’s that you and I work better together than we do at odds from each other. If you are willing, I’m...” She looked down and, with a pang, I realized just how many tough emotional declarations she’d had to make today and what that had to have cost her.

“I know you are,” I finished for her. “Can...” I tentatively reached forward and brushed her hair back off her face. “Can I kiss you again?” I asked, my voice very small.

She smiled at me and I swear, it was the happiest I’d ever seen her look. “Of course you can, don’t be ridiculous,” she answered. I heard the brusque commander voice sliding into place to cover the holes in her emotional walls and grinned. She meant business.

Permission granted, I kissed her for the first time without fear of death or worries about betrayal or major emotional turmoil and holy shit, I could die happy now. Hungrily, I leaned into her like she was the only thing holding me up, which at this point was more factual statement than poetical description. Taking a chance - basically the theme of the day at this point - I kissed the corner of her mouth and then trailed my mouth down along her jawline to her neck. As soon as my lips grazed her neck, she sighed and sort of melted against me.

Oh fuck. I knew I was in trouble. I knew I’d move freaking  _ mountains _ to hear Renee Minkowski make that breathy little sigh even just one more time. I was just about to start trying when a wolf-whistle from behind me made me pull back guiltily. 

But it was just Dominik, grinning down at us and shaking his head. “So this is how it’s gonna be, huh?” he asked. “Can’t leave you two alone for a second.” He looked momentarily concerned. “Not,” he added “because you’re doing anything wrong, Doug. I just don’t want to miss out on the spectacular view.”

I laughed and Minkowski grinned up at him. “Better keep your eyes peeled then,” she said enigmatically.

Dominik reached out a hand to help me out of the booth. Once he’d pulled me to standing, we were on eye level with one another. He was maybe an inch shorter, but his face was still very close to mine. He was still smiling but his blue eyes were intense. 

What was that thought I’d just had about this being a day for risks? Never let it be said that Doug Eiffel had ever lacked commitment to a running bit.

I flicked my eyes down to his lips and when I looked back up, he was doing the same to me. When our eyes met again, his held a hint of a challenge.

Eh, what the hell?

Giving him plenty of time to back away or say no, I leaned forward and kissed Dominik.

He - well, he definitely didn’t back away or protest. He was a much more assertive kisser than his wife, though I suspected Minkowski would catch up once all the weird uncertainty wore off. Yes, this was definitely a field to which I was determined to devote much scientific study. Many arduous hours, if need be.

We broke apart and Dominik glanced over my shoulder at his wife, still sitting in our vacated booth. I turned to look back at her too and - 

_ Oh. _

She was staring up at us with an expression that I honestly wasn’t sure how to read other than slightly  _ predatory _ . It was a looked I’d seen on her face before, when she’d really get into an argument with Lovelace and was feeling territorial. At first, especially with that context, I was afraid I’d made a huge mistake and she wanted me to back off of her husband.

But then I realized she was watching us  _ both _ with that expression and it clicked.

_ Oh. _

Minkowski was into this.  _ Really _ into this. Which made me realize how incredibly surreally exciting this situation was and why the hell were we still in a public place and not, say, a bedroom?

“Okay,” I said quietly, looking back and forth between my two... my two whats? Eh, that was an issue for later. “I move we get out of here right the hell now.”

“Seconded,” said Minkowski and Dominik in unison.

“Settled,” I replied. “Great. Good. Let’s go.” I turned and pulled Minkowski - was it weird to call someone by their last name when you planned to be kissing them on a regular and frequent basis? probably - out of the booth and we headed for the door.

“You know we can probably never go in there again,” muttered Minkowski.

“Oh yeah,” I nodded.

“Absolutely,” agreed Dominik.

“We’re a menace to polite society,” I added.

“Polite society?” Minkowski asked skeptically. “That was a dive bar, Doug.”

I shrugged. “‘Bout as polite as my society gets, boss. My standards and taste are not that high.”

Dominik laughed. “Which is, of course, a glowing commentary on us,” he teased.

“Well you know what they say,” said Minkowski as she unlocked their car. “Even a broken clock...”

“Ooh, can I be midnight?” asked Dominik.

“Shotgun!” I called while he was distracted. 

Minkowski sighed and muttered something about being hoisted by her own petard under her breath as we piled into the car and headed home. 

 


	7. in the end i'd do it all again (epilogue)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final chapter, folks. Thanks for sticking with us! (Also the NSFW chapter, FYI.)

Eiffel was drowsily yawning into Dominik’s shoulder at 10:30 on a Wednesday night, watching Minkowski compare prices on the name brand Lucky Charms versus the  generic Marshmallow Stars brand. 

Minkowski hated sugary cereals, but Eiffel loved them and they’d run out of their last box this morning, along with the milk, the coffee, and apparently dryer sheets.

So now here they were and Minkowski was talking about the amount of sweeteners in the various brands and Dominik was making bad puns about every product name and Eiffel was grinning with sleepy-lazy-happy emotion, and then… 

Then it hit him. 

This was here to stay. 

This, _them,_ wasn’t going to be half-assed attempt at a relationship that someone would abandon two weeks in because Eiffel was a pain in the ass to them. Or because Eiffel himself wanted to leave before they figured out his general pain-in-the-ass lifestyle. 

Sure, maybe Eiffel should have realized this was going to be a long-term thing somewhere around the time the two of them didn’t cut off all contact with him when he left them a two am voicemail talking about that time he’d had sex with Minkowski. Or when Minkowski had kissed him. Or when they’d gone to a dive bar to talk out their relationship with him. Or when Minkowski had kissed him again, or when Dominik had kissed him, and okay look Eiffel’s lack of skill with detecting warm fuzzy feelings that other people had for him was not the point of this train of thought.

The point was Minkowski was buying sugary cereals for him. And he would needle her about her boring raisin bran and Dominik would steal from both of their bowls when he thought they weren’t looking and… And Eiffel turned his face into Dominik’s shoulder more, hiding the definitely-not-tears, Eiffel was not afraid to cry, he was just. The onions. The onions that were multiple aisles away, they were getting to him. 

“Doug, you good?” Dominik murmured. He slipped an arm around Eiffel’s waist, tugging the other man closer. Eiffel was taller than him, but at this point had mastered the art of folding himself up to fit into both of his shorter partners’ hugs. It was a necessary skill. 

“Fine,” he mumbled. “Super, super fine. The finest.” 

Dominik nodded solemnly, his chin brushing Eiffel’s hair. “Anything you say three times must be true.” 

Eiffel laughed, the sound a little more choked-up, a little more vulnerable, than he would have preferred to be in a public area. “Glad we agree.” He sighed into Dominik’s shirt, breathing in and out slowly.

From across the aisle, Minkowski glanced at them. She was smiling in that way she almost never did in space. Big and bright and maybe a little tired, but none of the bone-deep exhaustion that took over everyone on the Hephaestus sooner or later. “Good to know you two are having fun over there,” she teased. “If you aren’t careful, I’m going to buy solely healthy cereals while you’re both distracted.” 

Eiffel pulled out of Dominik’s hug to snatch the box of Lucky Charms out of Minkowski’s hand and drop it in the cart. She was joking, sure, but you could never be too careful. After all, they were magically delicious. 

She shook her head in mock disappointment, belied by the grin still on her face. “You’re ridiculous.” 

He smiled at her, leaning on the edge of their cart dramatically. “And you love it?” 

“God help me, I really do,” Minkowski admitted. And then she grabbed the opposite end of the cart and pulled it out from underneath Eiffel, setting him flailing to try and grabbing for Dominik’s hand to help him stay on his feet. 

Neither of them quite succeeded, ending up catching themselves on the shelving of the aisle behind them with a crunch of mildly crushed cereal bags and an ominous creaking from the shelves themselves. 

“Well,” Dominik said after a moment of silence. “I suppose we can be certain that we’ve fallen for each other now.” 

Eiffel snickered, pushing himself and Dominik back onto their own four feet. “Yeah, guess you could say we’re all really _cereal_ about this.” 

“That was a bit of a stretch,” Dominik said. “But _Cheerio,_ Doug, I’m sure you’ll get it next time.” 

“I’m going to leave both of you here,” Minkowski interrupted. “Do not test me on this.” She was hiding a grin as she turned away from them to push the cart further down the aisle, getting in one last parting shot. “And besides, I think both of you need to _Chex_ your puns before you actually say them out loud, or someone might get a cereal box to the face.” 

“I surrender,” Eiffel volunteered almost before she’d finished speaking, jogging after her. “As long as the Lucky Charms get bought, I think I can live with losing this battle.”

Dominik shook his head ruefully as he followed them. “And to think, we almost won that time.” He caught up to them a few minutes later.

Eiffel walked between Minkowski and Dominik, beaming and laughing and knowing that there was no place he’d rather be. Except maybe at home with the two of them, between them on their couch or in their hallway or kitchen or bed or honestly at any place in the house the three shared. He wasn’t picky. 

The rest of the shopping rolled by in a blur of fluorescent lights and squeaking grocery cart wheels. It seemed like no time at all until they were setting the plastic bags in the trunk and driving home, pulling into their driveway and tumbling into the kitchen together.

* * *

It didn’t start any different than most evenings in their home. The lights were dimmed, the sole illumination a dim glow from the windows. Someone fumbled around for a light switch unsuccessfully, ready to put the groceries away and head to sleep.

But.

There was a moment when the night shifted, when the groceries were dropped on the kitchen floor and Dominik was pushing Eiffel up against Minkowski and she was braced against him from behind. Her lips on his neck, Dominik’s teeth on his skin… It was more than Eiffel had the words for and he knew nothing was ever perfect but he couldn’t imagine a thing better than this. 

The lights were left off, leaving the three of them cast in marble and moonlight.

They hardly noticed the darkness, too wrapped up in the people around them to care about a silly thing like being able to see. 

Minkowski was panting behind Eiffel, and they were so close that he could feel every move she made. Every time she shifted back to lean against the counter behind her, every place her hands moved over Eiffel’s body, every hot breath against his neck. It was almost too much, especially with Dominik in front of him like this, biting at Eiffel’s lower lip and tugging on his hair.

Eiffel couldn’t hold back a moan when Minkowski reached around to palm at the front of his jeans. “A little, hhh, eager, aren’t we?” he gasped, letting his head loll back to rest on her shoulder.

She laughed, the sound soft and low and so so close. “Oh, someone’s definitely eager,” she murmured. “Not sure if those in glass houses should be throwing stones.”

“Darling, stop teasing the poor man,” Dominik said, but he had moved to slide his hands up Eiffel’s shirt and Minkowski was still fiddling with the button on Eiffel’s jeans and so the sentiment was all but lost on Eiffel. He arched forward into Dominik’s touch and Minkowski followed him with her own body, the friction between them almost too much even now.

Eiffel was hard already, had been hard for probably an embarrassing amount of time at this point but that was okay, that was _great,_ because Minkowski had figured out his jeans and hadn’t even bothered pushing them any further than was necessary to push his boxers out of the way and get her hands on his cock.

It wasn’t the first time, not by a long shot. But every time, there was a second where it was. There was a second when Eiffel was floating on the bridge and Minkowski was looking at him with those dark, dark eyes and moving so careful, so gentle, like he was going to fall to pieces under her hands.

Except now he was here, and it was Dominik’s eyes and still Minkowski’s hands, always Minkowski’s hands. Their house - _their_ house, the three of them, all in this together after everything - surrounded them. It was familiar, gentle, and gravity weighed upon all of them like it never had in space. Minkowski twisted her hand around him and he whined, and honestly she was probably right about the falling to pieces thing.

He became doubly certain of that when Minkowski drew her hands back, pressed them into the vee of his hips and held him still while Dominik knelt in front of him.

“You up for this, love?” Dominik asked, grinning wickedly.

Eiffel huffed out a laugh, almost lost in his already heavy breathing. He opened his mouth to answer but by then Dominik’s lips were already wrapped around him and he couldn’t do anything but jerk forward into Dominik’s mouth and make helpless sounds.

He reached backwards, grasping for Minkowski’s hand where it still rested on his hip. She was there, she was steady, like she always was. 

There was a place for Eiffel here. There always would be. 

Weeell maybe not _here_ here exactly, pinned between Minkowski and Dominik doing wicked things to him, but here. With them.

And _here_ here was truly an excellent place to be.

Dominik’s mouth was hot and wet and his movements were sloppy and fast, reducing Eiffel to near incoherency. Minkowski was talking to him, hands holding onto his hips hard enough to bruise and lips brushing against the shell of his ear with every word.

“Come on, Eiffel,” she murmured. “It’s okay.” And then, a beat of silence, a beat where there was nothing but the three of them. The slick-wet sounds of Dominik on his knees, Eiffel and Minkowski breathing in ragged synchrony. “Doug,” Minkowski whispered, and Eiffel was closing his eyes with pleasure and coming into Dominik’s mouth before she even finished her sentence. He slumped back against Minkowski as Dominik sat back on his heels, grinning and wiping his mouth with one hand. 

Minkowski laughed, low and rough and god Eiffel loved these two people more than he could bear. “In a little bit of a hurry, Doug?”

He shrugged, aiming for nonchalant and ending somewhere north of ‘desperately in love’. “I mean, I’m always happy to return the favor.”

Dominik reached up for Eiffel’s hand, and he gladly gave it to help pull the other man to his feet. “I don’t know about you,” he said, “But I think our lovely Renee deserves quite a few favors from us.” 

“You don’t have to tell me twice.” 

Minkowski was still chuckling at the both of them as Eiffel turned in her arms and kissed her. Minkowski didn’t kiss like Eiffel would have expected her to, before he knew her like this. She kissed like the world was falling to pieces around them, desperate and messy and one of the best things Eiffel had ever had. 

She bit his lower lip and he couldn’t hold back a whine. 

“You’re gonna be the death of me, Renee,” he breathed, barely audible, and then it was his turn to kneel in front of her. 

God, Minkowski was gorgeous from an angle like this. Which was not to mean she wasn’t gorgeous all the time every single day, it was just the vulnerability, the openness, everything about her right now was hitting all of Eiffel’s buttons. Above him, Dominik was leaning over to kiss Minkowski thoroughly. Eiffel pressed his face against one of her thighs, enjoying the feeling of being the middle of a truly delightful sandwich for the second time that night. 

Minkowski reached down, tugged on his hair a little. 

“I get the message, boss,” he joked. “Who’s in a hurry now?” 

Eiffel kissed her hip where her shirt rode up to reveal bare skin, and then worked her pants down to her ankles and got to work. 

She came with Eiffel’s tongue on her clit and Dominik’s in her mouth, gasping and shaking and the most beautiful fucking thing on or off Earth. 

Dominik tipped his head forward to rest against Minkowski’s. “Tell me truthfully,” he whispered. “Doug’s better at that than I am, right?” 

She laughed again, and Eiffel would never get tired of hearing that sound. “You’ve got other strengths, I promise.” 

“Oh, do I?” 

Eiffel couldn’t see where Dominik’s hands were but he did something that made Minkowski yelp and then laugh and pull him down into another kiss. He smiled up at the two of them, for once in his life completely happy to be just here and now and nowhere else. 

Minkowski looked down at him and matched his smile. “Want to join us up here anytime soon, Doug?” 

He beamed at her and gratefully accepted a proffered hand up. Once he was standing, Minkowski pulled him and Dominik into a hug. “I love you two. You know that, right?” 

“I mean, I can always stand to hear it a couple hundred more times,” Eiffel quipped. Minkowski shook her head, still smiling. 

“We both love you, Eiffel,” Dominik said.

Eiffel couldn’t seem to stop smiling. His face was actually kind of beginning to hurt but he couldn’t bring himself to want to stop smiling even so. “I… I love you guys too. A lot. Like, seriously, kind of a ridiculously embarrassing amount, like, whoa there Doug, you might need to-” Minkowski kissed him, cutting him off. 

He kissed her back without hesitation, finally able to allow himself affections like this. Things weren’t magically fixed, and the Doug and Renee who stood in their living room with their boyfriend/husband would never be the same people who had stepped onto the Hephaestus, so many years ago. But no one was ever the same person that they used to be, and, well. 

It had led them here. 

Eiffel couldn’t regret that. 

He couldn’t regret any of it, not when it led to buying cereal in their pajamas or impromptu blow jobs or Minkowski, leading both of her boys into their shared bedroom to continue this night. This was it for him. Wherever being with Minkowski and Dominik led him, he would go. 

They deserved this - all three of them, Eiffel and Minkowski and Dominik, after all that time and all that horror. They deserved this happiness in each other. It didn’t matter whether that happiness was falling asleep piled on top of each other or Minkowski, on top of Dominik, closing her eyes and biting her lip while Eiffel talked the two of them through it, low and rough and dirty in the best, best way. 

Tonight it was that second one. 

Another night, the first. 

However their story went, it was enough. _This_ was enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed! Hit us up on tumblr at [harpers-mirror](https://harpers-mirror.tumblr.com/) and   
> [wendy-comet](http://wendy-comet.tumblr.com/) for more minkaffel and the like! :D It's been a long ride, folks. Glad to have shared it with you.


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